Laura Lentz

ENGL 21007

Professor Jacobson

December 20, 2022

Self Assessment 

Throughout the course of ENGL 21007, there were multiple objectives presented with the intentions of bettering my writing. These objectives were goals set at the beginning of the semester to track the growth of my writing. To what extent I have achieved the course learning objectives, is one main objective. The second one states, in what ways have my perceptions on what writing has evolved this semester. Throughout the course there were four assignments, including this one, that have showcased my writing abilities and tracked my progression. These assignments include a lab report analysis, technical description, engineering proposal, and this self assessment essay. Not only has my writing progressed through this course, my definition of writing has grown and changed as well. The two main questions that will be answered, how has my writing shaped and grown throughout the semester and how has my definition of writing changed as well. 

Coming into this class, my definition of writing was defined as a form of expression. Within these months, I have formed a new definition of writing that combines elements we explored during the semester and my original definition. My perception of writing has developed throughout the semester into a more connection based definition. When entering into this class writing, to myself, was personal. Other than professional writing such as research or essays, writing was a form of expression for an individual. I connected to writing through poetry, books, or lyrics, which is where my definition came from. After multiple assignments throughout this course, I have shaped my view on writing. This class influenced my opinion on professional writing, through specific assignments, I grew to see writing as more of a communication source. The lab report analysis, which was one of the beginning assignments in the year, had a large impact on my thoughts of writing. This analysis was a tool to explore what the author’s intent of their writing was. While the author and myself communicated through their writing, I then wrote my writing, the analysis, with the intent of connecting and sharing with my audience. This assignment formed a professional yet personal type of communication that was a new outlook on writing for myself. The engineering proposal as well shaped the views I had on writing. Previous collaborative writing assignments I had partaken in, I had known the groups members involved. For this particular assignment, the people in this collaboration were strangers, I had not known their names when beginning the assignment. Working and connecting with the physical as well as tangible form of communication impacted how I viewed writing. Working with different opinions and mindsets formed a writing that would not have been possible without different individuals working together. Collaboratively writing is just as strong as when writing individually. Working in a group formed a new view on writing. Not all writing has to be personal or individualistic. There is a power in bringing minds together to create writing together. With these elements brought together my definition of writing is an expressive form of communication through many mediums and platforms.  

The course learning objectives are incorporated not to discourage students, but to allow students to use these objectives to better themselves throughout the course. Having written goals at the beginning of the semester allowed for the ability to look back and see which goals were achieved as well as which goals have a little more work to go. There were two main course objectives and 8 more specific goals. I feel I have made progress in each aspect of the learning objectives. While there is still room for growth, improvements have been made. 

The first learning objective was written to acknowledge your and others’ range of linguistic differences as resources, and draw on those resources to develop rhetorical sensibility. Through peer review and collaborative writing, linguistic differences were used to develop rhetorical sensibility. Through peer reviews others views and opinions were used to better my personal writing and vice versa. When working collaboratively different ideas were shared to create a unified piece of writing. 

The second is to enhance strategies for reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment. I feel I have strongly seen improvements throughout myself in this specific area. In the lab report analysis, the annotations were a new form of research that I had not been introduced to before. Thoroughly reading through and marking articles helped not only with the reading portion of the assignment but also the drafting and revising portions as well. When drafting the paper, information was easy to find. When revising, if I had a question about the research or information it was simple to find where I found the information with it being marked out. I enjoyed the process of annotating articles and will take this into future writings. The editing and self assessment portion I feel positively grew for myself during this semester as well. Involving myself in peer reviews was very beneficial. I enjoyed having a stranger edit my writing and give back constructive criticism. 

The next goal was to negotiate your own writing goals and audience expectations regarding conventions of genre, medium, and rhetorical situations. Goals that I had in mind when entering this class regarding genre, medium, and rhetorical situations, were to work to make myself feel comfortable with new elements of each of these. I am not an engineering major, when entering this class I came in open minded with the hope of learning new stuff. I feel I have seen improvements in this area while there is still more room for growth. 

Developing and engaging in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes is the next objective. This can be seen through the work of the engineering proposal. An innovation was created and collaboratively the proposal was written as well as a presentation was made for the innovation. I worked collaboratively with three others to create and present this innovation to the class. Through this assignment I worked and about the writing process with others as well as time management with others when working together. 

Another objective was engage in genre analysis and multimodal composing to explore effective writing across disciplinary contexts and beyond formulate and articulate a stance through and in your writing. Through the lab report analysis I engaged in genre analysis. I studied a written lab report and the elements included in it. I did the same with another report and compared the two articles. This was a new genre that I had not indepthly looked at. 

The next objective was practice using various library resources, online databases, and the Internet to locate sources appropriate to your writing projects. Depending on which assignment, different criteria needed to be met. When writing the lab report analysis there was a requirement that only the CUNY database and library could be used. For previous assignments or writing I have not had such a strict requirement on sources that were allowed to be used. Entering into the lab report analysis, I thought finding the resources I needed was going to be a challenge, but using the CUNY specific database narrowed down the opinions in a positive manner. When using outside sources for other assignments such as the technical description, I felt confident with my abilities when entering the class and do feel confident about my abilities now leaving the course. 

Strengthen your source use practices (including evaluating, integrating, quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, analyzing, and citing sources) was the next objective. Previous to this class I regularly used MLA format and had only used or implemented APA formatting once for a previous class. With these aspects of quoting, paraphrasing, and citing sources, using APA was a new and educational experience for myself. 

In conclusion, throughout this course my process and thoughts on writing have been shaped and changed. My definition of writing expanded, now being more open to different forms rather than seen as having one main purpose. Previous to this class I viewed writing as being personal and for the purpose of expression, but also educational. After working collaboratively through the proposal assignment as well as elements of others assignments, my view of writing expanded to be seen more for communication purposes now. I find writing to be a tool to bring similar or opposing minds to people to communicate about a common topic. These writings can be personal, as I saw them before, or can be presented as more professional. I feel confident about how I have seen growth through the learning objectives that were presented at the beginning of the course as well. My drafting, revising, editing and other elements of writing have improved through group work such as peer review. My ability to work collaboratively as well has benefited from this course due to the engineering assignment. Aspects such as citations, paraphrasing and other elements similar to such, I did see improvement through each writing. Despite some growth I can see that these elements, specifically in APA format are likely to still see improvements in the future. I have improved through the course objectives during this past semester and feel confident in how my writing has developed. I plan to take these course objectives into future classes and writings to continue my growth as a writer.